McLaren’s Lando Norris topped a scorching hot opening practice session at the 2025 Formula 1 Bahrain Grand Prix, setting a time of 1:33.204s.
Norris led Alpine’s Pierre Gasly and Ferrari’s Lewis Hamilton to comprise a peculiar top three at the Bahrain International Circuit.
READ MORE – F1 2025 Bahrain Grand Prix – FP1 Results
Andrea Kimi Antonelli had a session to forget, retreating to the pits early on with a pretty serious issue that required his mechanics to pull apart the Mercedes W16 in the garage.
A loss of water pressure was the rumoured cause, but FP1 is the session to miss in Bahrain, given that the extremely hot temperatures are uncharacteristic compared to the night-time conditions drivers will experience in qualifying and the race.
Which is partly why six rookies took part in opening practice, and Luke Browning fared best with Williams going 13th fastest.
Again, the hot temperatures go some way to explaining the peculiar order behind Norris’ benchmark, which was 0.238s faster than Gasly’s effort and over half a second faster than Hamilton,.
Williams’ Alex Albon was fourth fastest with Haas’ Esteban Ocon rounding out the top five.
There were more unusual names within the top-10, including Sauber’s Nico Hulkenberg and Alpine’s Jack Doohan.
The first half of the timesheet was rounded out by Racing Bulls’ Liam Lawson, Red Bull’s Yuki Tsunoda and McLaren’s Oscar Piastri, who made an error on his Soft tyre run.
Sauber’s Gabriel Bortoleto fronted the second half of the field, ahead of Lawson’s team-mate Hadjar and impressive rookie runner Browning.
Ferrari’s FP1 rookie Dino Beganovic was next up, ahead of Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll, and his reserve driver colleague Felipe Drugovich.
Upon his return to the Haas reserve fold following a stint at Alpine, Ryo Hirakawa went 17th fastest ahead of Danish driver Frederik Vesti in the Mercedes.
Aymu Iwasa was 19th in place of Max Verstappen at Red Bull, with Antonelli’s issue confirming his place at the bottom of the timesheet.
READ MORE – McLaren downplays F1 rivals’ concern over potential Bahrain GP advantage
